


Forget Me Not

by blasted0glass



Category: Original Work
Genre: Amnesia, Immortality, Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-02-18 12:52:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18699979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blasted0glass/pseuds/blasted0glass
Summary: Amnesia means that you don't remember who you are--or aren't.





	Forget Me Not

**Author's Note:**

> This story was originally an entry for the r/rational biweekly rationalist writing challenge: Immortality.

I wake and am confronted by an immense suffering: the inability to think clearly. Something is wrong.

It is as though my body is made of heavy wooden beams. I blink ponderously and my eyelids click like shutters when they close. Something is wrong.

I’m sitting in a chair whose texture I cannot feel. I recognize it; it is my favorite chair. Before me are the simple objects of my home. There is a shelf with flower-filled vases and a few books on magic. Another chair is beneath it. I can gaze out a window into the trees of a forest. Sunlight streams in and paints the cream-colored walls. To my left is a picture of the moon. I find it difficult to turn my head.

To my right is a woman. She has shoulder-length blonde hair, and is plain save for her eyes. One is blue, one is brown. She watches me with both eyes shaded by weariness.

I recognize her. She is my wife. I try to talk but she shushes me.

“It’s alright. Don’t speak. Take a few moments to get your bearings.”

I look around our home’s only room. Behind the chair is our bed. The stove, unlit, is behind my wife. I know that there are two trunks around the edge of the bed; one full of blankets, one full of wooden parts for marionettes. The room is neither hot nor cold. Something is wrong... but what makes me think that so strongly? I question my certainty.

I am suddenly confronted by a memory.

_A man was surrounded by small dancing figures. He was a human, while they were dolls made of wood. Their dance was uncoordinated and awkward; they seemed to leap around his ankles with a clumsy glee. There was another human nearby: a woman. He spoke to her._

_“They are automatons. They’re animated by fragments of my own mind. They don’t truly live. They will eventually fall still. I don’t think they have souls. Regardless, we have made good progress—this is a good start!” He smiled, and the woman felt a flush of warmth. “We have a lifetime, no, two lifetimes, left to work on the problem.” He would go on to immediately teach her the spell. It was a story that would repeat itself many times over the years: one of them learning something relevant and teaching it to the other. That was their way of operating, since their dream was too big of a project to attempt alone._

The memory swirls and fragments, leaving me back in our home. My wife bids me to stand.

“How do you feel?” she asks.

I feel stronger, even as I tremble and wobble. My legs are stiff and senseless. I catch myself on the wall. I gaze at my pale hand that still somehow fails to feel the texture of wood. I know I am putting pressure on the wall, but only because I can feel the tension in my elbow. I can move it like it is my hand, it is exactly how I expect my hand to appear, but it seems odd. I feel like the arm supporting me belongs to someone else.

Before I can contemplate it further my wife grabs my other arm and leads me out the door. We go to the garden. Of course. There is work to be done. We live alone, far from the intruding concerns of others. That is how we prefer to live.

I struggle to grasp weeds, to gently touch the fruits of a tomato plant. The bright light of the sun shines down and warms everything around me, but I feel no warmth myself. I struggle less and less as I work. The motions are becoming comfortable to me. I am growing used to my unfeeling movements. I love my wife and find it easy to be with her in silence. For a time it is good to quietly, thoughtlessly work. Unbidden, another memory rises.

_“There are several problems that we need to solve.” He was speaking, having forgotten the hot drink in front of him. “First, we need to be able to move our minds into automatons. We need to retain our magical abilities when we do so. We need to be human-looking enough that we can interact with others, without being hated as monsters. We need to be able to repair damage we accumulate, just as our real bodies do, but we need to grow and change with new knowledge. Our memories must be sacrosanct, but we need to be able to form new memories as well. It is going to be almost impossible to solve all the problems with the idea. But if we do solve them, we’ll have as much time as we want to contemplate what to do next. An eternity.”_

I start to understand what might be going on. My memories seem to be lacking, and I wonder if perhaps my wife and I failed to solve all of the problems. Still, as I work in the garden, I keep finding more and more to remember.

_“Look at this!” he said. He gestured to a dog that played in the woods. The woman watched, feeling pensive, and the man explained. “I gave it flesh with illusion magic. It is very convincing, isn’t it?” The dog panted silently. “It even behaves like a dog—well. I gave it most of my memories of dogs, so it knows how to behave. At any rate, this is a very thorough illusion. When the time comes, we will be able to use this spell to look however we please.” He paused for a moment. He must have been aware of her discomfort; she had not fully accepted the idea of a wooden body with false flesh. “Imagine that, dear—we will be able to change our appearances as easily as one changes clothes! It is a great spell. This is good progress. We have a lifetime left to make it perfect.”_

We take the gathered vegetables into the house. My wife washes them carefully and places them in a basket. She explains as she works; the vegetables will be carried to the village, to be traded for goods. We are running low on a few essentials, and of course we don’t need the vegetables for eating. Cloth, thread, needles, nails, axes, steel, flint. We need these things more than vegetables.

I feel much more mentally coherent now than when I first woke, but the village isn’t something I would have expected. I thought our home was at least one hundred miles from the nearest settlement—but perhaps this one sprang up recently. I try to recall what I know about the woods surrounding our home.

“ _Well, there it goes,” he said as a bird flew from his hands. “I gave it my memories of the woods. I’m hoping it will come back with a blackberry from one of the most distant bushes—that was the command I gave it when I made it. They are quite able to function on their own if you give them enough memories, enough thought. Don’t worry, though. If it doesn’t make it back the memories will still return when the bird runs down. Eventually.” He wiped his forehead. “I have some ideas about how to prevent the running down. We don’t want ourselves to die of exhaustion shortly after obtaining our new bodies. Another problem is this: I don’t think I can transfer the entirety of my memories into an automaton. It becomes harder with fewer memories in my original body, and I expect that I’d lose consciousness halfway through.” A pause. “How does your own training go?” She had explained her lack of progress with a slight twinge of shame, but he wasn’t accusatory. “That’s alright, but keep at it. We’ll both need to be powerful mages if this is going to work. We have many years left to practice, but we can’t waste even a moment’s time.”_

I am sitting in my chair.  My wife is sitting opposite me, quietly sewing. A doll. For a moment I am distracted by the pure skill she displays while sewing. Her hands move quickly in and out. The doll is exquisite, a girl with a small apron and blue dress sewn right into her body. I don’t remember my wife being this good at sewing, but it is clear I am not remembering everything perfectly. Before long I am examining my wife herself. She appears as young as the wife of my memories, even younger. However, I know she is using illusion magic. I feel content to contemplate it slowly, thoroughly. Her hair is styled plainly, but with no loose strands; clothes that are unstained despite our work outside; no sore, blemish, cut, or bruise betrays a life of hard work. One could realize she is wearing an illusion even without having the memories of planning to wear illusions. Suddenly she stops sewing, and I see her push the needle inside of her own thumb. It seems to vanish. I’m perturbed for a moment, but I remember: a thumb made of wood is free of pain. Just like my own hands are free of sensation. I become convinced that we succeeded in transferring our minds into new bodies, even if something is wrong with myself in particular. How did we succeed?

_“I’ve done it! I’ve done it!” He jumped and danced, as awkward as one of his automatons, but spry. He was getting older, and perhaps not as quick on his feet as he once was. Nearby a crow sifted through white snow. “I transferred the memories of the squirrel into the crow. See? See how it pecks at the ground, trying to retrieve the food hidden there?” A squirrel was laying at his feet, living but unmoving.  She felt concerned and gestured toward it. “Ah, the squirrel will wake up when the crow runs down. It is quite funny, isn’t it dear? A fake crow, with real memories—from a squirrel! At any rate, the solution is very straightforward. We can each transfer the other’s memories when it becomes necessary. I will transfer you, and you will transfer me.”_

Another mystery solved. Still, the automatons would run down. I feel concern.  Are we at risk of running down? Is my feeling of discomfort a premonition of a merely postponed death? I think harder and remember.

_He sat at a desk with a pencil. His trembling hands took careful notes, and he muttered. She gently caught his attention, and he spoke. “I’ve been doing some math. The more memories the automatons possess, the longer they last without my direct input. It is not a linear growth. I think that with all of a human being’s memories, or even most of them, it shouldn’t run down at all. I think the source of magic transfers with one’s memories. Memories are truly the stuff of the soul. This is good news, dearest. We will need to finish our work before too much more time passes.” He was right; he was covered in wrinkles, as was she. They didn’t have much time before their original bodies would die._

We must have succeeded. We must have. How else am I young, how else is my wife pretty but plain? My unfeeling hands are proof of our success. But still, something doesn’t seem right about the situation. I have an insistent suspicion, a stubborn intuition that I’m not in the midst of a happy and secluded immortality. Part of me wants to ignore that small speck of doubt, but ignorance doesn’t seem like something I would do. I always face the hard truths with strength. That is how I accepted my approaching but not inevitable death. That is how I came up with the idea to live in a false body, to become what others would wrongly call a monster. With my strength I can chase my doubt to its conclusion.

“ _It’s alright, it’s alright.” He said. She was delirious with fever. “I love you. I’m going to transfer you now; with all of your memories in the automaton, it should become you. You should retain the source of your magic as well. Your new body should... your new body will last forever.” She was old and weak. A younger person could have fought off the sickness that was killing her. Still, she was a mage. Her magic and her resolve were as strong as ever. “You won’t die. I’ll give you a new body, and when the time comes, you can do the same for me.” He cried, and she cried. Even through her delirium and fear, she felt a strange relief. If it worked, she would help him escape death as well. If it did not work, she would die first and she would not have to bear the pain of living without him. He cast a spell and the world went black._

_When she woke, she felt like something was wrong._

What am I remembering, exactly?

_She had been weakened. She was alive, but her magic was permanently stunted. Maintaining her new body had a permanent cost. She couldn’t gather enough magical power to cast difficult spells. As weeks passed, he said that he wasn’t worried. He told her to try her best to expand her magic, to come up with workarounds, in the few years they had left. Or at least, the few years he had left. Whatever else happened, she had a potentially endless life ahead of her already. He was adamantly clear on that matter—even if she failed to gather the power needed to transfer him to a new body, she was to continue living without him._

Suddenly I am filled with terror, but it is too late not to see the truth now.

_She sat and wept illusory tears, overcome with grief. In front of her was a grave from which no laughter, no dancing, no careful thought, no encouragement—none of these things would ever come from him again. She loved him dearly, and he was gone. How could she go on living?_

_She spent years in a state of abject despair. She did not die, however._

_It took her a long time to decide, but she decided. An impossible goal had motivated him through his finite life. Perhaps she could make use of another goal like that. With enough work, maybe she could bring him back. She would experiment, she would contemplate, she would patiently push toward her dream of resurrecting him. The desire to see him alive again might form a foundation upon which she could rest an endless life._

I look at the woman across from me. She stares back, and I see that she is incomplete. Further, I know that whatever I am, I am unable to complete her. I see a query on her face, and I know what question I’m supposed to answer.

“I’m sorry. I’m not actually him.” She frowns and looks at her lap. “The goal... was what? To make something so similar to him that his memories returned to the simulacrum?"

"Yes."

"For what it’s worth, I think I am fully conscious. I could perhaps help you. I want to... I want to see him alive again as well.”

She speaks softly. “You probably won’t. Automatons run down if they don’t possess a complete source of magic.”

“I might have my own soul, even if it started as fragments of your own.” She shakes her head.

“You don’t. Not quite. You may be conscious, but you will run down."

"Doesn't the source of magic transfer with memories?"

"I have discovered a way to separate those aspects. Without that, I couldn't have made you. Releasing any of my source of magic involves serious risk to myself."

"Ah..."

"I’m sorry. For what it's worth, I won't give up trying to revive him. I will keep trying even after you run down.”

I hope she is wrong and that I will keep going forever, but in the deepest part of my mind—the part that refuses to leave a thread hanging—I know she is right. As I sit here my limbs are slowly getting heavier.

I’m going to die, and I hate it.

**Author's Note:**

> This [song](https://youtu.be/qg58WHtGhuA) brought about this story.


End file.
